U.K. Labour Party chief whip Ivan Lewis, who is Jewish, resigned from the party on Thursday amid sexual-harassment allegations against him, in addition to charges of anti-Semitism within his party.
Lewis, who will continue to be in the British parliament as an independent, said in his resignation announcement that party leader Jeremy Corbyn has been “unwilling to condemn those whose hatred of Israel becomes Jewish hatred,” and that Labour’s disciplinary process into the accusations of sexual harassment, which Lewis denied, was “subject to political manipulation.”
He also accused Corbyn and Labour executive director of strategy and communications Seumas Milne of being against “the right of the Jewish people to self-determination in their own state.”
“It is very sad that after over 20 years as a Labour MP, Ivan Lewis felt morally compelled to resign the Labour whip because the party that was fiercely anti-racist when he joined it has now become infested with anti-Semitism,” said Gideon Falter, chairman of the Campaign Against Antisemitism. “It is inevitable that if a political party is led by an anti-Semite who lets Jew-hatred run rampant, people of conscience will leave. The indications are that others may now follow where Ivan Lewis and Frank Field have led.”
